Why Boxer dog's die young

Not a boxer story, but...

A friend of mine (Frog, he was a fishing guide) had a beautiful redbone hound puppy, he named Rufus. Frog was out chipping golfballs into the lake where he lived (his brother was a marina diver and the balls made for good practice) and Rufus walked up under his legs during his backswing and caught a mouthfull of 9-iron. He rushed the pup to the vet and he ended up being Ok, but his snout was pretty messed up and even as an adult, he never had teeth in the front. Rufus grew into a really nice looking dog, dispite the jacked-up face, and actually suited Frog better, since he had a pretty jacked-up face himself. He could only eat soft food - Rufus not Frog.

Always remember where your pup is, just like a human toddler - they will get underfoot, under car, generally in harms way.

Frog and some of his friend had a cookout on the lake, you know, burgers, etc. When they came in from swimming and got the fire going, the hamburger was gone. It was one of those 10 lb. plastic tubes. Frog just figured he had forgotten to bring it and walked over to the marina to buy more. The next day Rufus was not moving very quickly. We noticed finally something red and white hanging from Rufus' "chute". It was the plastic hamburger tube. Frog finally got to Rufus and stood on the plastic while the hound slowly slid, drug and crawled away. It was pretty much in one piece. Rufus was ok and lived a long happy life (I think he was 16 when he died). The two stories made Rufus famous aboung the tourists and locals alike, he was a friendly and outgoing dog, for a hound.

So watch what you leave lying around. Dogs have an amazing sense of smell (even with a jacked-up face) and an amazing capacity for getting into trouble.

Great advice 4flats! I might add another story that I've posted before:

My friend Scott had a German Shepherd Dog mix named Buddy that he had for about 2 years. One day him, his girfriend and his girlfriends young daughter left for 15 minutes to run to the drug store and came back to find his dog dead. It seems that a friend of his that was over a few hours earlier had finished up a mylar bag of potato chips and thrown it in the small, open kitchen garbage can and Buddy got into it and suffacated himself. It was tragic and I can't imagine how tough it was for the little girl to see thier dog dead in a pile of poop.

Ever since then I always cut the bottoms out of any plastic bags that get thrown out. One of those big stainless kitchen garbage cans with a lid is a good idea too but a good size dog can knock those over if so inclined.

Just a word of warning. I'd hate to see anyone ever have to go through this ever again.

One more thing, don't play with your dog on a slick wood floor. That's how Maxi broke her leg. Her leg still isn't right and been almost a year. I wish I could roll back time.